ASAM AND THE NEIGHBOURING COUNTRIES. 451 



our way through : we mounted several peaks connected by ridges 

 with the parent height, but from the commanding points, whence we 

 ought to have had an extended view, we looked down on nought but 

 masses of white mist and clouds. Mists also driving like rain, almost 

 always obscured the view of the snows above us. The first snow we 

 passed, was lying in small unconnected patches, but about two o'clock 

 we came to the foot of a sheet which covered the whole apex of the moun- 

 tain, and found that, since the naked-limbed guides and Slngfos 

 could not endure sinking up to the knee in it, we had to make a cir- 

 cuit to avoid the deepest bed. The very few trees towards the 

 summit were junipers, but those upon the flat table, which forms the apex, 

 were miserable things of four or five feet in height. According to report, 

 from this elevated peak* the view includes not only the valley of the Ira- 

 wadi, with the plains of Hukung and Mungkhung at an immense dis- 

 tance, but also the Lama country to the N.E. ; however, far from enjoying 

 these beauties, we only saw the dense mist, which, driven along by a strong 

 wind, wet us to the skin. The guides being deprived of a sight of sur- 

 rounding objects, became doubtful of the way, and we were detained for 

 an hour trying the descent on all sides, till they agreed that the direction 

 we had first taken must be the right one, and in that we soon found 

 ourselves moving rapidly down towards the south, in a ravine filled with 

 snow, below the crust of which the roaring of the head of the Phungan 

 rivulet was loudly audible. At half-past four, we had cleared the great 

 sheet, and the snow remained only in patches ; but our guides giving us 

 no hopes of reaching a halting place having more advantages, we agreed 

 to stay, where there was not a leaf but that of the fir, or rhododendron, to 

 build our huts of — nor wood for fires, but that which was sodden and wet. 

 We had luckily a quilt each and a rug. The rugs we stretched to branches 



* The Barometer was set at three or four hundred feet below the summit ; it gave the altitude 

 above the sea 12,174? feet. 



